Batman: City of Fear
by MissScorp
Summary: The Scarecrow has decided to bring Gotham to its knees by thrusting the city into the midst of one collectively shared nightmare. T for comic level violence, language and themes. Set during Dick Grayson's tenure as Robin. *Complete*
1. Gone to Hell

**A/N:** Hello m'dears… and welcome!

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* * *

Chaos once again enveloped Gotham City.

This, of course, was not an unusual occurrence. Raya Kean knew that bedlam and Gotham were as synonymous as peanut butter and chocolate. It was when this city was quiet that it was at its most dangerous. She'd learned at a very young age that looks could be deceiving, especially in a city that was constantly ravaged by an anachronistic clown hell-bent on waging warfare upon their silent guardian. Raya knew there were an innumerable amount of shady deals going on at that very moment in Gotham's seedy underground. There were at least a half dozen acts of violence being perpetrated behind closed doors in both the Bristol District, and in the homes of North Gotham alone at that moment. The streets of Gotham City were a chess board where the white pieces were the innocent Gothamites and the black the criminals who wanted to knock over their King.

Hell erupted just after nine that evening in a hailstorm of thunder, lightning and an ominous boom which sounded above the roar which shattered the stillness of the night. At first, Raya thought it merely was the sound of a car backfiring. Then she realized that a car backfiring wouldn't rattle the walls of her uncle's office. She blew out a breath and turned her head towards the window. She saw police flashers congregating in an area just a few blocks away from the GCPD building. She pushed away from her uncle's desk and walked over to stare out at the city that was once again being used as the stage for some dramatic play. Against the smooth velvet of the sky, the Batsymbol shone like a warm beacon. A smile curved her lips as she thought of the two costumed men who were even now joining the police in stopping whichever of Gotham's super criminals had decided it was a good night to become an agent of chaos. Eerie words from Shakespeare's _Macbeth_ danced into her mind, and became a fitting way to describe the anarchy threatening to engulf this city. '_Blood will have blood_.'

The explosion was the first act of this particular play. Whichever of Gotham's super criminals was the mastermind of this plot was truly a vile individual. They were a barbarian, barely worth considering as being human for setting off a bomb intended to hurt innocent people. Shakespeare though would say that _'fair is foul and foul is fair_.' Like the greatest of his tragedies, this plot could only end with bloodshed. Again came the lightning and thunder, but the rain at least had slowed to a steady, drumming splatter. The worst of the storm had passed over. A part of her noted the appropriate sound and lighting effects. After all, this scene was the opening of the drama and most important to the development of the plot. All the action turned on it. All the players depended upon it. She drew a deep controlling breath and sent up a prayer to whatever deity was on duty to keep the men she loved safe.

"Hey, kiddo." Raya heard a gruff voice say behind her. She turned and saw Detective Harvey Bullock standing in the open doorway, his tan trench coat in one hand and a faded fedora in the other. "C'mon," he said with a slightly crooked smile. "Your uncle wants me ta get ya home before things get any worse out there."

Raya scooped her hair out of her face and smiled. Following her kidnapping a few years ago by her uncle's then partner, Matthew Branson, she'd grown suspicious and wary of the officers who served in her uncle's unit. Harvey Bullock was the only one, besides her uncle, who she knew was on the up and up. He was also the only member of her Uncle Jim's squad she trusted, and would agree to leave the GCPD in the company of. Something that Lieutenant James Gordon had counted upon when he asked the veteran detective to escort her home.

"What is going on out there, Mr. Bullock?" she asked as she stepped over to the desk and slid her chemistry textbook back into her backpack. "I can see a lot of police cruisers circling around the Diamond District. Has one of our super criminals decided that tonight is a good night to come out and play?"

"Never youse mind what's going on over in the Diamond District," Harvey replied gruffly as he plopped his hat on his head. He saw her frown, dark brows drawing together over her pert nose. He knew that look. It was the same look his wife and kids got whenever he told them not to worry. It was a look which said _too late, I'm already worrying_. He knew the kid was concerned about her uncle. Since losing her mother a little over a year ago, she'd become even more protective of her uncle. He instantly softened (as he so frequently did when it came to the petite girl) and told her, "Your uncle is gonna be fine, kiddo. Batman's already been called ta help with the situation."

_And where Batman goes_, Raya mused silently. _Robin is sure to follow_. Raya didn't say anything about Batman and Robin though, merely gave a nod of her head before grabbing the strap of her bag and walking over to him. "Youse ready?" he asked as he pulled on his coat.

"Yup," she replied with a smile.

"Let's go then."

Raya followed him from the building, and walked with him towards the police parking lot that was nearby. She noticed that a SWAT van was parked across the street and that several uniformed and vested officers were standing around it, talking. A little boy, about five or six, with hair as dark as her own was tugging at the sleeve of one of the vested officers.

"I can't find Mrs. Mac," the boy was whimpering.

"Get away from me, ya brat!" The officer snarled before he shoved the boy. The boy stumbled backwards, flaying his arms in order to keep his balance, but ended up falling down into a puddle of water. Raya ran over to the boy and helped him up to his feet.

"Are you okay, sweetie?" she asked him in a soft voice. The little boy nodded and looked up at her with huge, shimmering eyes a deep, rich shade of blue.

"Uh-huh," he said, his lower lip quivering in a way that melted her heart.

"Hey, what the hell is wrong with you?" she demanded of the officer. "You can't shove a kid like that! I'm going to report you to my uncle for this!" The officer merely turned away, completely ignoring her. Raya's eyebrows shot up. _Oh, it's on now buddy_, she thought. As she held the boy's hand she shouted at him. "Hey! Look at me when I'm talking to you!"

The officer turned, drew his pistol from his holster, and aimed it right at Raya. The little boy gasped and burrowed against her side. The officer was prevented from pulling the trigger when a low, sinister laugh echoed from the shadows behind them.

"My dear man! Is that anyway to treat a child?" It was a voice which Raya knew: polished and cultured, rich with intelligence and slippery with an underlying hint of the madness which bent the man's soul. _Oh no_. _Not him. Please, God, not him_. Even as her heartbeat slowed to barely a tick, she watched as a man wearing frayed and pieced together brown clothing and a burlap gas mask stepped from the rear of the van. Her stomach curdled as she found herself standing face to face with the last man she wanted to find herself standing face to face with. _Oh, Bruce, I have never needed you and Dick more than I do at this moment_. Behind him, there was a bulky industrial machine of some sort with an ominously glowing red button.

"It is time for this city to learn a new word," he cooed, "and that new word is... _fear_."

He pressed a button on the machine and laughed, a high shrill, cackle which sent chills shooting up and down Raya's spine.


	2. City of Fear

**A/N:** Hello m'dears… I hope the week has been a good one to you!

Please, if you like this story, click the follow/favorite button. Also, reviews are deeply cherished!

* * *

"You can't shove a kid like that! I'm going to report you to my uncle for this!" Bullock heard Raya shouting and immediately knew she was no longer following him like she was supposed to be. "Hey! Look at me when I'm talking to you!"

Harvey shook his head, smirked, released a gruff sigh, and told himself he really was not all that surprised that the kid had somehow managed to find a cause when she shouldn't be looking for one. That the cause concerned another kid was something else that did not surprise the veteran detective any. Raya Kean was not one to remain quiet if she saw any type of injustice being perpetrated in her presence. It had become the joke of the division about how they should have _her_ teach ethics at the police academy. But then_,_ he thought fondly as he stopped, she'd gotten her sense of justice and moral integrity from James Gordon. Jim didn't put up with these kinds of shenanigans any more than Raya. Jim had set an example for his children, showing them not only how a good cop should conduct himself, but how a decent human being responded when they saw something they knew was not right. _So what is it you saw, kiddo_, Bullock wondered while he lit a cigarette.

He took a drag as he turned in the direction he'd heard her yell come from, ready to enjoy watching as the spunky teen tore into whoever had earned her ire. That Raya had a wit as sharp as barbed wire was legendary among the Major Crimes Unit. His eyes widened in shock when he saw a rookie officer (he believed the kid's name was Dawson) pull his pistol and aim it right at Raya. Even standing across the street as he was he could see the blood drain from her face. The little boy who was standing at her side let out a soft shriek and instantly tucked himself against her, his tiny arms winding around her left leg like moss around a tree trunk. _Just who did this punk think he was_? Bullock thought as his eyes narrowed into thin, dangerous slits. _Aim a gun at a kid? Jim's kid?_

Not on his watch.

Pure rage surged within the veteran detective. This was more than just conduct that was absolutely unbecoming of anybody, much less an officer of the law. This was a crime of the lowest order. _You wanna threaten the kid? Take on me, pal_. He was a bulldog who was just let off his leash and simply told "sic 'em boy." He let out a feral growl and went to barrel across the street in order to tear the tawny haired officer to pieces for daring to level a firearm at two innocent kids, much less one who was the niece of their Lieutenant. He'd only just made it off the curb when a low, sinister laugh echoed from the alleyway behind the SWAT vehicle.

"My dear man!" The voice said cheerfully. "Is that anyway to treat a child?"

Bullock felt his blood run cold as he spotted the familiar figure who scuttled out of the darkness towards the three standing immobile. Attired in an outfit comprised of frayed and pieced together brown cloth and a burlap gas mask, the Scarecrow appeared from behind the van. Bullock's stomach lurched violently when he realized Raya was now standing face to face with one of the last men she needed to find herself standing face to face with. _Only that pasty faced son of a bitch would be worse than the Scarecrow, _he realized as he automatically reached for his own pistol.

His hand froze in mid-reach when he saw the doctor shuffle closer towards Raya, his long, elongated dactyls stretching out to sweep over the boy's cheek. Raya barred her teeth in a wordless snarl and slapped his hand away. Seeing the pluckiness of the fourteen-year old disturbed that ulcer he'd been ignoring for months. Two burlap masked men set a bulky industrial machine with an ominously glowing red button on the pavement behind the softly chuckling madman.

Bullock's breath expelled in a rush. He had known the situation was going to be bad soon as he saw the Scarecrow was involved, but he grasped the point of what he'd just seen quite well. And the implications of it were horribly, horribly clear. Bullock forced his legs to move, ignored the sharp pain in his chest as he tried to reach the girl who was standing in the middle of the disaster zone.

"It is time for this city to learn a new word," the Scarecrow crooned in a warm, wet whisper, "and that new word is... _fear_."

He pressed that demonic button with a high, shrill cackle that had chills racing up and down his spine. _Shit,_ Bullock thought as his heart dropped down into his feet. _Shit, shit, shit._..

"Get outta there, kiddo!" he managed to yell mere seconds before the street was engulfed in madness.

* * *

Within seconds, the chaos swirled like a tornado and engulfed the entire city in its path of destruction. It was as if a thousand bombs had been dumped upon the city. Fire hydrants blew their caps and gushed like geysers. Manholes were blasted high into the air. Sewer pipes burst, street lamps exploded, and the city went black as the entrance to hell. The streets were soon filled with broken glass and water sliding out from under foundations and pouring from bathrooms and kitchens all throughout Gotham.

The cobblestone streets became flooded and cars and people soon became stranded in the toxic onslaught. Alarms began to ring all over the city and emergency sirens shrieked. Thousands of Gothamites were awakened by the cataclysmic blast, blinked sleepy eyes, stared at clocks and then out of windows, asking, "What's going on, now?" before they reached for phones and computers in order to call family and friends to ask if any of them knew what the hell was happening.

In a nursing home over by Gotham General, a group of men in their eighties and nineties found where they'd stashed their M1911's and told each other that they knew the Nazi's would come back one day. People caught out on the streets raced to the nearest house of worship while dozens upon dozens of others clutched their loved ones tight and prayed for the madness to come to an end. They'd be sadly disappointed, however. For over at Blackgate Penitentiary, the power outage opened locks and tossed open cell doors, releasing a swarm of evil upon the already beleaguered city.

* * *

Something had exploded next to Raya, throwing her backwards, and she felt something hot pierce her cheeks and forehead. Her blouse was ripped along one arm and her elbow was throbbing-that was the first thing she became aware of. She blinked her eyes and slowly sat up, trying to make sense of what was going on. The street was filling with... what? she wondered. Smoke? No, there were no fires. So what was it? It was a vaporous like steam she realized. As if someone had turned on the hot water and allowed it to flood the city. But no, that wasn't right.

Crane had pushed a button on his machine... _wait, that's it, _she realized, her stomach heaving with a greasy wave of nausea so powerful she nearly vomited the contents of her stomach. Crane must have unearthed a new type of _fear_ toxin, one that when combined with water would cause a type of steam. _This is a hallucinogenic mist. _Raya let out a small gasp as the implications, as well as the ramifications of her deduction, became startlingly clear. _I have to get into contact with Bruce and Dick. They need to know what Crane has unleashed upon the city._ She heard a soft whimper then and glanced over to see the dark haired boy lying face down next to the right rear tire of the van. He was hurt. She began crawling towards him on her hands and knees.

* * *

Lieutenant James Gordon was standing near a manhole when the lid flew into the air like a bottle rocket, taking parts of the street and closest building with it. Mortar and cobblestone rained down, a piece of which struck Gordon in the side of the head. He went down and heard one of his officers shout something incoherently at him. Another blast sounded close to him and he felt something pierce his arm, face and neck. When he laid his hand on his neck, his fingers came back sticky with blood and bits of glass and diet.

In that moment he knew that whatever the Scarecrow had been planning had just been unleashed. Gotham was once again an open war zone. On one side was himself and some of the finest officers (all men and women that Gordon personally selected for his unit) to ever work for the GCPD, and on the other was this fiend and his band of masked vermin. Nobody, not even Batman, could have predicted that this was what the crazed madman was going to do. How could they have? It just didn't seem possible. He got to his feet and felt warm blood running down the side of his face like hot caramel.

A thin mist slowly began to roll like an ocean wave down the street, sliding over anything and everything that fell in its path. He saw Officer Markinson, a blurred silhouette, waving his arms and screaming. At what? Something Gordon couldn't see? Or... something that wasn't actually there? Markinson yanked his pistol from its holster and began firing wildly. The flash from the muzzle of the gun elongated and became serpents that streaked towards Gordon, hissing fire-

He was hallucinating and knew he'd only have only a few seconds before his rational mind would become bound within the toxin's neurological compound. He fumbled for his radio and tried to send out a message for whomever was not in the area to fall back and get indoors if they could. He got the radio out, but then he had a problem; his thumb and fingers had gone numb and he couldn't press the button to make the radio work.

He fumbled the radio in his frustration, dropping it and was bending down to retrieve it when he felt something jab into his arm. He let out a grunt when he felt liquid nitrogen sizzle into his vein. His fingers regained feeling. He turned just as something went singing past his ear. Markinson was still waving his gun and shooting; a bullet missed Gordon by mere inches. Now Markinson was aiming at the masked teen, Robin he silently corrected, who was standing beside him.

"John-no!" Gordon shouted.

Markinson either did not, or could not, hear him. Robin brought the man down with a flying tackle. They locked arms and legs and rolled upon the cobblestone. Markinson got an arm free at one point and landed a punch that rocked the younger boy's head to the side. Markinson rolled on top of Robin and tried to get his hands around the teenager's throat. Gordon lurched forward, meaning to help subdue the officer, but Robin landed an upwards palm thrust to the man's chin that knocked him loose.

Robin pulled another syringe from his pouch and jabbed it into Markinson's arm before he dragged the man over to a pipe and used his own cuffs to cuff him to it. Gordon walked towards him but stopped when he heard a sound begin to rise up all around him. It began as a low wail at first. Then it rose into a howl that increased with volume and intensity until it seemed to become the only ambient sound in the entire universe. What the hell...? Gordon shared a look with Robin and saw the teen crime fighter had realized what the sound was at the same instant he had.

It was the sound of many voices, thousands upon thousands of them, all wailing in mortal terror.


	3. Streets of Confusion

**A/N:** Hello m'dears… I hope the week has been a good one to you!

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* * *

In the space of the three seconds that it took for her to crawl over to the injured boy, Raya realized something very bad was about to happen in the city of Gotham. The mist formed a blanket over the street, making it impossible to see. She knew the vaporous toxin was going to infect her, already she could feel the back of her throat beginning to burn and she choked on a gasp. Her eyes began to water and she knuckled the moisture away before she looked up...

..._winged figure's slithered out from a hollow opening in the vaporous mist, glowing red orbs winking playfully, and searing fangs dripping ooze as they stretch into feral grins_.

Raya stifled a shriek and tossed her arms over her head. She knew she'd been drugged, just like everyone else in the city was. The toxin was in the steam caressing her skin, sliding beneath the fringe of her consciousness and storming the gates of her unprotected mind. She heard the boy sobbing and calling for his mother. _God, what must you be seeing_? Hearing him cry snapped her back to reality, though.

Raya willed her fear aside-not away for that was beyond her, and forced herself to think. And then she felt fury rise up to strangle the fear. How dare Crane use unsuspecting people to conduct his perverted experimentations upon! Soon as she could contact Bruce, the sooner Crane was going to be made to pay for the horrors he'd inflicted upon so many innocent Gothamites this night. _And upon this little boy most of all_, she thought hotly.

"Hey, it's gonna be okay," she murmured to him. "Nobody's gonna hurt you. I promise."

"Oh, I wouldn't advise making such a promise to one so young and impressionable," a slippery smooth voice said from behind Raya and the boy. She curved her body instinctively around the child's shivering form and glared up into flashing yellow eyes and an oral cavity with wriggling ropes and...

..._maggots and worms boiled up and out of the mask's empty eyeholes, rained down from out of that gaping black maw_.

Raya hammered back the burst of fear, her concern at that moment for the child who clung desperately to her. A dark, skeletal shape emerged from out of the mist. It was Crane, wearing his burlap mask. She saw shapes beginning to gather behind him; inmates who'd been waiting transport in the prison van.

"You'll pay for this," she hissed at the emaciated figure. "You understand me? You are gonna pay for what you have done to the people of Gotham tonight."

"And pray tell who," The Scarecrow simpered in a voice which grated upon her already raw nerves; "do you think is going to make me pay, Miss Berkeley? _Batman_?" He laughed, one high pitched cackle that had her lips peeling back in a wordless snarl. "Or perhaps you await rescue by his little _Robin_?"

Raya may have been all of fourteen, but she was far from stupid. Crane was a licensed Psychologist with years of experience in conducting psychological research. Just like her grandfather, Crane would have given thought to the topic he was researching. He would have carefully selected the research method he would use to test his variables. He would set the parameters of that method and stage how the experiment would be conducted, and by whom. He'd have taken all possible outliers and confounding variables into consideration in order to ensure his results were conclusive, valid and reputable.

That Crane was not worried at all about either Batman or Robin coming for him and potentially skewing his data could mean only one thing: he had a contingency plan in place in which to stop them. But what type of plan she could only wonder at. The answer flashed into Raya then, warm and bright: _her_. He'd addressed her as Miss Berkeley, she realized, her eyes blinking wide and her breath whistling out from between her teeth.

It meant he not only knew who _she_ was, but that she was an ally of _both_ the dark knight and his young partner. He was planning on using her to entrap Batman and Robin and keep them from putting a halt to his despicable experiment. It not only explained why Crane was there in the first place, but also why he'd chosen to unleash his diabolical machine outside the GCPD. It was all one elaborately contrived plot meant to bring Gotham's dynamic duo to their knees.

_The hell with that_ _and with him_, she thought as she tossed her head and glared up into those flashing eyes. _I'll never help lure Bruce and Dick into danger. _She scrambled to her feet and scooped the boy up into her arms before tearing off into the dense fog.

"After her!" Crane snapped shrilly at the figures surrounding him.

Raya heard feet pounding behind her and tore off into an alleyway. Ensuring the safety of the boy in her arms was her highest priority at that moment. Exactly how she was going to accomplish that feat was proving to be rather difficult. Without a grapnel line she could not get them to higher ground. Nor could she rightly scale the side of the building with him in her arms.

She needed to find some place where she could use the flare Bruce ordered her to carry. It was an established distress signal, one meant to be used if she could not reach him any other way. But she had to use the flare some place where she and the child could hole up in as they waited for help to arrive. The question on her mind currently was _where_. She stumbled and crashed into a trio of garbage cans, but stubbornly pushed on. Stopping meant the death of this boy as well as the two men who'd tear the city apart in order to get to her. She turned down another alley and stopped. Dead end. They had nowhere to run, and nowhere to hide. They were trapped.

Raya felt her world tilt; crumble. She was alone, without any of the gear Bruce had given her, extremely low on options, and the only adult available to protect a defenseless kid. She heard a giggle, faint and unmistakable and turned to watch Crane materialize from out of the very mist he'd created. He paused a few feet from her and the now whimpering boy and purred, "You have nowhere to go, my little lovely."

His minions circled around him, hulking shadows wearing burlap masks and promising pain. Raya set the boy down and reached into a pocket of her backpack. She had one move left she could make, and she needed to make it count.

"Come with me now," he crooned, holding out the hand which was covered by that Freddy Krueger like glove. In the shadows created by the dense mist, the syringes which tipped his fingers glowed like neon symbols of toxic death. "And I will spare the boy. Defy me and you will not like the consequences."

"Go to hell," Raya spat, and pulled a flare out. She ignited it and tossed it at Crane, watching as a spark from the red-hot flame caught in a piece of the frayed burlap covering the doctor's skeletal arm. Crane shrieked, and began to wildly beat at the smoldering material before he tore off through the fog, desperate to find a drop of water in which to put out the cloth with. The inmates scattered once their leader abandoned them, unwilling to become her next target of attack. Raya then knelt beside the boy and curved her arms around him, crooning softly while she tried to figure out what the hell she was supposed to do now.

* * *

Gordon glanced over at Robin once Markinson was secure. "Hey, kid, you okay?"

Robin flashed him a cheeky grin from over his left shoulder. "Poison Ivy hits a whole lot harder than that guy does, Lieutenant."

Gordon swallowed the _dad_ comment which instantly sprang to mind as soon as the boy blithely mentioned the villainess known throughout the city of Gotham as Poison Ivy. It disturbed him that any fourteen-year-old should know about the existence of, much less routinely engaging in combative measures against a woman with Pamela Isley's botanist skills. This wasn't his kid, though, and he told himself that he had no right to go _dad_ upon him. However, it wasn't easy for him to turn off his _dad-mode_.

This tousled hair youth was the same age as his Raya. For all he knew, Robin was in the same grade of junior high his girl was. He could be in one or more of her primary classes. He could be someone his girl had known from infancy (he did look a little like Robert Samson's son, Joshua), that she had a crush upon (he could be that boy of Bruce Wayne's), that she saw every day in the cafeteria (he could be that Bronson boy now that he thought about it). In short, he could have met Robin somewhere along the way and had no idea that that young man and this masked teen were one and the same.

_Kid should be worrying about things like passing the exam to get his driver's permit, working at the local movie theater, or getting to second base with his girlfriend_, he thought. _He shouldn't be concerned with how to save an entire city that has just been saturated in fear by a burlap sack wearing freak_.

"Lieutenant," he heard Robin say. "Things are going to get a whole lot worse here very soon."

"I know things are going to get a whole lot worse son," Gordon murmured. "What do you suggest that we do? I don't think Batman has the quantity of antidote we need in order to counter this much fear toxin."

It was clear that Robin was thinking that very same thing. "Can you radio for more reinforcements? Keeping the people calm and out of this mist is the best that we can do for them at this point."

"It's better than doing nothing," he said before walking over to his patrol car. He could hear the sirens screaming in the distance, saw police flashers visible through the dense cloud lying heavy over the streets. Cops were out there, which meant help was out there. He just needed to get that help where it was needed the most. He keyed the cruiser's radio and identified himself to the dispatcher. The radio squawked before he'd barely checked in.

"_Jim_," he recognized the voice as that of Detective Harvey Bullock. "_I'm glad ta hear your voice_. _Things have gone ta shit out here and we could use ya back here at headquarters_."

"Harvey, I need you to get all men and women not out in the streets already together," Gordon said. "Call in the tac teams, SWAT, riot squad-get 'em all in masks and..."

"_Jim, the Scarecrow was waiting outside headquarters_."

"What?" Gordon exclaimed on a tattered breath. He heard a rustle of cloth and glanced over to see that Robin had come to stand beside him. He could read fear in the depths of those oh so familiar blue eyes and was puzzled by his reaction. He again wondered if he knew this boy. And he found himself questioning whether he was willfully turning a blind eye to the truth because he either didn't want to know, or was keeping himself from admitting so as to protect the kid.

"The Scarecrow was waiting outside the GCPD? You're sure?"

"_I saw him with my own eyes, Jim. Burlap mask, tattered clothing, Freddy Krueger like glove on his one hand. It was Crane_."

Gordon closed his eyes for a moment. Why? he wondered. Why was the madman waiting outside police headquarters? What was the endgame of such a move? Then he felt his blood run cold as one distinct possibility for why Dr. Jonathan Crane might have been waiting outside the GCPD popped into his mind.

"Where is Raya, Harvey?"

"_Jim_..." Harvey said slowly.

"Dammit, Harvey, tell me that you got my girl home before the Scarecrow turned this damned city into one huge research experiment!"

"_Goddamn it, Jim, I turned my back for one second and she was gone." _

Jim closed his eyes and squeezed the radio in his hand. "What happened?"

_"I don't know. We were leaving HQ when she saw a kid being picked on by that rookie, Dawson. And ya know how the kid can be when she sees another kid gettin' picked on_."

He did know about how Raya could be when she saw a kid being abused. For his niece, abuse was something that ran deep. "All right," he said. "And Crane?"

"_He was waiting for the kid._" There was a pause punctuated by a long sigh. "_Goddamn it, Jim, the sick son of a bitch was waiting for her ta leave the GCPD_."

"Why? What possible reason could the man have for wanting Raya?" But Gordon had a burning hole in his belly and a knot in his chest that was telling him the answer was wearing a green mask and a cape. And he could tell by the sudden blanching of Robin's face that the teenager had drawn that very same conclusion.

"_Why else, Jim_?" came Bullock's gruff reply. "_Ta trap Batman and Robin_."

He stared again at the flashing lights winking in the distance. He was the law of Gotham, a defender of truth and justice, the protector of the innocent. And yet when it was his own kid who was being hunted by a schizophrenic monster, he was unable to do anything to help her. His _dad-mode_ screamed in protest even as the rational part of his mind whispered to him that it was up to Robin to save Raya from the Scarecrow. _He can get across the city faster than I can. He can get to her before I can_. He turned his head, intending to ask the boy for his help, but found he was standing by the patrol car alone. "Huh," he said softly. "Kid's picked up on Batman's habit of disappearing as silently as the wind."


	4. Rescue

**A/N:** Hello m'dears… I hope that your week has been a good one!

Please, if you like this story, click the follow/favorite button. Also, reviews are deeply cherished!

* * *

A procession of police cars, vans, buses, and motorcycles were lining the streets outside Blackgate. GCTV news choppers as well as police helicopters whirred overhead, their spotlights sweeping over the twisted remains of what had once been the left side of the prison. Even the canine units stood at the ready, the dogs silent as they, much like every Gotham City police officer stood at the ready, just waiting for a word from their Commissioner telling them to sweep in, hunt down, and lockup the scum that the Scarecrow was trying to release upon their ravaged city.

Batman parked the Batmobile by a row of abandoned cruisers and was about to step from the car when a soft chime in his ear alerted him to an incoming call. Only five people knew this private number. He'd spoken to Alfred a number of minutes ago and knew that Crane had set off some sort of bomb in the city. Could it be Gordon then with more information? He pressed a button on the steering wheel with his thumb in order to answer.

"What is it, Jim?"

"Bruce?" He heard Dick puff.

"I'm rather busy at the moment, Dick," he said. "Is this important? Or can it wait for until after I have investigated the situation here at Blackgate?"

"That's the point of why I am calling," Dick chuffed in his ear. He heard a grunt and the scrape of gravel and pictured his boy scrambling across a rooftop en route to whatever destination he was heading too. "Blackgate is a ruse, Bruce. It was meant to keep you busy so that Crane could unleash his real plan."

"What do you mean by his _real_ plan?" Bruce asked in a hard whisper.

"That's not what is important right now..."

"That's rather funny coming from someone who disobeyed his father, and mentor just last night because he thought something else was more important than the task he was assigned."

"Do we have to get into this now?" There was a raw note of _fear_ in the younger man's voice which triggered alarm bells inside Bruce's head. Instantly, his body tensed, coiling to attack whatever and whoever had put that note in his boy's voice. Then he heard Dick sigh and could well imagine the troubled expression upon the teen superhero's face. "Bruce, I know you're mad at me for what happened last night. And I admit I should have listened to you. I should have obeyed your directives and not involved Raya in my plans. However, this isn't about last night, or about you being angry with me, or with her for that matter."

"Then why…" Bruce began but Dick cut him off, his tone fractured with worry and a snap of youthful impatience.

"Raya is in the heart of Crane's blast zone, Bruce."

It felt as if he'd been punched in the gut. His breath whooshed out and his head spun.

"What?" he rasped. "Why was she at the GCPD? Why wasn't she at home?"

_Where she's supposed to be_! He silently raged. Cold and clammy tendrils began slithering around inside him, and Bruce could feel them burrowing deep in his heart. Then the leeches began giggling, fiendishly before they whispered in a warm, moist hiss, _She's ours now, Batman_. _She's ours, and there's nothing you can do about it._ He sliced those serpents in two with a thick sword made out of cold hard iron.

"Gordon had Raya with him at the GCPD when the Blackgate breakout occurred," was Dick's somber reply. "Bullock was taking her home when Crane unleashed holy hell upon the city." There was a pause and Bruce imagined it was because the boy was air born and focused upon getting to his next point of landing safely. He knew when he was again safely perched when Dick said, "She is somewhere around the GCPD, where Crane set off his first toxin bomb. And according to Bullock, he's stalking her." There was another pause. "This is about her, Bruce. Everything Crane is doing tonight has been about getting his hands upon Raya."

Bruce suspected that the reasons for that involved her grandfather; Matthew Berkeley Sr. Kidnapping the man's granddaughter and holding her in exchange for the ingredients of a new formula Dr. Berkeley was rumored to be in the process of manufacturing was the only reason that a man Crane could have for pulling a stunt like this. There was simply no other logical reason for why Crane would be so intent upon getting his hands upon a fourteen-year-old girl otherwise. He kept his suspicions to himself and hit the button to fire up the Batmobile's turbine engine once more.

"Where are you?" he asked Dick.

"I'm too far away for us to meet up." Bruce heard a _poom _and knew that he'd fired a grapnel line. Then his son was saying, "You have to get to her, Bruce. You have to get to her and fast. If Crane..."

Dick didn't finish his sentence.

He didn't need to finish that sentence.

Bruce already knew what would happen if Crane got his hands upon Raya.

And he swore to tear the man apart before he'd ever allow that to happen.

* * *

This was _her_ fault, he thought peevishly. If the brat would not have fought him, if she would have given into her fears like everyone else, then none of this would have happened. He was supposed to have gotten her back to his research facility over an hour ago. He was supposed to even now be making his phone call to Dr. Berkeley, demanding that the man turn over all of his research notes upon his new behavior modifying agent in exchange the twit. Instead, he found himself wandering the streets of the city that he'd made quake with fear.

While he was wandering he realized that he had a bit of a problem: where exactly was he? That little terror's attack had completely disoriented him and the thick fog was obscuring any and all familiar landmarks from view. He had to do something, anything, and so he chose to continue walking. And while he walked, he planned his vengeance upon the girl who'd so determinedly thwarted being captured. The Scarecrow didn't know how long he walked, or where exactly he was walking too. He stood still, in the dark, his senses alive and tingling. Where to go? Not the asylum. The asylum was going to be crawling with activity at that time. His original destination once he had the Berkeley girl in his grasp had been a small warehouse down by Gotham docks. That could yet be an idea. But how to get there without being seen by any number of the police roaming the city, or by Batman himself, could prove to be especially difficult. So where else could he go?

Suddenly he felt a shift deep with himself. Felt _Jonathan Crane_ struggling to rise to the surface. He felt that simpering, sniveling, spineless side of himself swell within him, trying to oust him, to seize control of him. As if he was going to allow that to happen! He had things to do, and research data to gather! But then he heard that refined little voice say, "return to the lab."

_Yes, the lab_, Scarecrow thought. _Why, it was perfect. Brilliant even_! Nobody would think to look for him in his former lab at Gotham University. They wouldn't believe that he'd dare to return to the very place where he'd begun his research in the phenomenon known as fear. He cackled, long and low, and was about to turn in the direction he presumed the university was when a black car pulled up at the curb beside him. Scarecrow turned to gaze at the black luxury vehicle, mildly curious about who could be inside. The back right passenger side window lowered.

"Dr. Crane?" a deep, masculine voice asked from the darkness of the car's interior.

_No_! he wanted to scream. _Not Dr. Crane! Scarecrow_! But was he? he suddenly wondered. Was he the Scarecrow? Or was he Dr. Jonathan Crane? No, he was neither one, exactly. He was _both_ Jonathan Crane and the Scarecrow at that moment. And wasn't it fitting that a superior being such as himself would have more than the paltry single identity that the rest of humanity was in possession of? He pulled off the burlap mask and became Dr. Crane once more.

"Yes, I am Dr. Crane," he replied politely. "Is there something that I can do for you?"

"Oh, yes," the man whispered in a low, dark voice. "There is something that only you can do for me, Doctor."

"And what is it that you need me to do for you?" Crane inquired.

"Get in and I shall tell you what it is that I want from you."

The door opened and the doctor saw a hand that was plump and very tan retract back into the dark interior. At the wrist, white cuffs were studded with square diamonds. The nails were buffed to a dull sheen and neatly clipped. On the man's pinky was a sapphire the size of a dove's egg. It was the telltale sign of wealth and privilege. Things which Jonathan Crane craved, but had never had the pleasure of having. Still, there was a certain element of propriety which had been overlooked here, and Crane felt it necessary to correct that oversight before agreeing to any business dealings with this man.

"I'm afraid we are at a bit of an impasse my good man," he simpered. "You see, you know who _I_ am, but I am quite ignorant as to who _you_ are…" he trailed off and smiled expectantly.

There was a slight sound which could have been a sigh before he heard the man say, "Berkeley," in a darkly arrogant tone. "Matthew Berkeley Jr."

Crane frowned, dark brows drawing together over his sharp nose. "You would not happen to be the father of Raya Berkeley, now, would you?"

"Indeed, I am, Dr. Crane," Berkeley replied coolly. "And it is my daughter that I wish to speak with you about. Now, get in."

Crane did.

* * *

The boy was shaking like a leaf, so Raya scooped him up into her arms and cuddled him close as she made her way through the dense fog. The going was slow, and she had no idea if she was even going in the right direction. All Raya knew was that if she could get back to police headquarters, if she could get him inside, he'd be out of this nightmare Crane had created. From her uncle's office in the GCPD she could call Alfred and have him relay a message to Bruce about what was going on. Then it was just a matter of holing up inside the GCPD until either Bruce or Dick was able to get to them. And if the dynamic duo was not able to get to them, well, so long as they could hold out until the sun rose...

Shadows began to appear in front of her, black shapes undulating in the pearlescent mist like sea serpents—at least eight to ten of them from what little she could see. One of the figures glided into a thin beam of light created by a car headlight and she saw he was wearing a SWAT jacket over his orange prison garb. She recognized the man almost immediately: Taylor Jensen. Her computer-like mind immediately did a mental search about what all she knew about this man. He was a repeat sex offender. Had a particular liking for little boys that were about the age of the one in her arms. Raya recognized the danger instantly.

_Now'd be a really good time to just drop in, Grayson_, she thought as a surge of desperation streaked through her. Getting to higher grounds quickly became her only viable option. She darted over to the side of a building, searching for a fire-escape ladder in which she could lift the boy up too. She finally located one, but she wasn't tall enough to reach the bottom rung. Frustration as well as fear scorched through her. If it was just herself that she needed to worry about here, she would turn and fight. Bruce had been instructing her in hand-to-hand combat for the last nine months and she'd gotten pretty proficient at defending herself. But she couldn't risk putting the boy in harm's way. Not with Jensen on the loose.

She heard footsteps shuffling behind her and hugged the boy to her, racking her brain for what she could do. She had no weapon, no phone, and she'd used her only signal flare in order to scare off Crane. She stepped sideways, and her foot connected with something solid. She glanced down and saw the body of the uniformed cop who'd aimed his gun at her earlier. The inmates drew closer. One of them was giggling. And she saw Jensen's face had a hard, hungry look on it that had her belly twisting violently. She left the boy by the wall of the building and knelt by the officer's body, searching it. His sidearm was missing (not surprising in her mind), as was his holdout pistol (again, not surprising). She pulled the can of pepper spray he had attached to his belt…

"Get back," she gritted. "I'm warning you…"

Jensen just grinned and continued coming towards her. Raya took a deep breath and aimed the can. Her finger squeezed the trigger. She wouldn't be able to spray all of them, but so long as she could spray Jensen, then the boy would be safe. For now…

A rasping command came from the darkness above her: "Take care of the boy, Raya."

Even as a relief so profound swamped her, threatened to send her to her knees in a sniveling, groveling mess, a dark figure swooped between her and the convicts. There was the satisfying sound of a fist meeting soft flesh, a grunt, and then Jensen fell. Raya grabbed hold of the boy, and Bruce grabbed Raya. She felt him reach for something beneath his cape, knew he'd grabbed his grapnel gun and heard the _schwoo_ after he fired a line. Then they were air born, cutting through the choking mist, shooting past the brick wall, over a parapet, and onto a roof. Raya knew that as soon as her feet hit solid ground that she should let go of Bruce. There were rules that needed to be obeyed, appearances that needed to be maintained, but she just couldn't bring herself to let him go. Her breath came out as a tattered rasp and her body began to tremble. She buried her face into the crook of his neck, breathing in the faint smell of his aftershave and finding comfort in it.

"Are you okay?" she heard him ask in that achingly familiar rumble she knew was _Batman's_.

She opened her mouth to answer him, to let him know she was okay, but no sound but for a small squeak came forth. She tried to force her arm to unwind from around his neck, ordered herself to let him go, but her arm refused to heed her command. Every single ounce of her screamed at her about how innocent people needed Batman more than she did, that they were suffering through their fears without their silent guardian to protect them. But she just couldn't bring herself to be rational. Not when nothing, _nothing_ had ever felt as good to her as the solid rock wall she was clinging too.

For once in her life, Raya Kean was selfish. She took for herself, was greedy, thought of what _she_ needed instead of what someone _else_ needed. And when those sticky fingers of guilt tugged and pulled at her conscience, she snapped back that she was fourteen and that this lapse was absolutely forgivable. Tears welled, fell like rain, and wet the column of his throat. She felt his chest vibrate as he made a low murmur deep in his throat, and felt his hand as it stroked down over the cap of her hair, along the taut line of her back.

"You're safe now," he told her quietly. "He can't hurt you...either of you, anymore."

"I know. I know we're safe," she whispered finally in a voice she almost didn't recognize as her own. "It's just..."

"Shh," he crooned in that velvet baritone she recognized as _Bruce's_. "Just take a moment and let it all settle, Raya."

That, Raya decided as she settled the boy more securely upon her left hip, was absolutely the best idea that she had heard all that evening.


	5. Aftermath

**A/N:** Hello m'dears… I hope the week has been a good one to you!

Please, if you like this story, click the follow/favorite button. Also, reviews are deeply cherished!

* * *

Dick found them still wrapped around each other about five minutes later. He'd been one ball of tension ever since he'd heard Detective Bullock say Crane was stalking Raya. That knot didn't ease until he saw she was safely ensconced in Bruce's arms, in shock clearly, but relatively unharmed. He took a moment to pull himself together before he walked over to the trio. His eyes met Bruce's briefly and he read the emotions which flashed through those eyes and knew that the night had taken a toll upon his mentor as much as it had upon him.

"Are you all right?" he asked Raya in a soft voice.

"Yeah," he heard Raya say in a voice which was thick still with unshed tears. She turned red-rimmed eyes upon him. "Yeah, I'm all right."

Hollow-eyed and pale, and far from all right, was his opinion. He kept it to himself, however. Last thing she needed was him poking fun at her for her overly emotional state. He decided to do something about that state by saying to her, "Aw, c'mon now, Rae, as if this wasn't just another game between us and the Gotham Bad Guys." He flashed a cheeky grin at her. "Ya should be used to how they like playing ball with us by now."

"Yeah, well, ya coulda showed up about five minutes ago, bird boy," she huffed. "Before the psychosexual predator decided _he_ was going to become the next player up on deck."

"You had a pinch hitter arrive in time," he pointed out. "So quit complaining."

The little boy upon her hip angled his head around to look at him then, and Dick saw that his eyes were these huge blue balls dominating the majority of his small face. Shock intermingled with awe and Dick gave him a reassuring smile in hopes it would calm him. He thought the kid looked familiar, but there was not enough light at the moment for him to make out his features well enough. He must have shivered because Raya shrugged out of her hoodie (well, it was actually _his _hoodie, he realized, giving her a baleful look) and wrapped it around him.

"Who's your new friend?" he asked her.

Raya angled her head to look down at the boy. "I'm not sure," she admitted with a slight frown. "There wasn't a whole lotta time for me to ask him his name what with Crane showing up and turning the area into a psychedelic battlefield." She smiled as she saw the boy was staring at Dick in wide-eyed fascination and a toddler's excitement. _Someone has a case of Robin-worship_, she thought with a small degree of bemusement. Not that she blamed him. She had a pretty serious case of Batman_ and _Robin-worship herself. "Sweetie, can you tell us your name?"

The kid's head shifted and he considered her solemnly. The world became illuminated for one brief second when a helicopter flying overhead bathed the rooftop in white light. Raya immediately recognized him once she saw him. _Drake_, she thought. _His last name is Drake_. So… "Is your name Timothy?"

He nodded his head. She glanced at Bruce. "I know him," she said. "I've watched him while his parents have attended functions that my father held at the Estate."

"Who are his parents?"

"Janet and Jack Drake."

Bruce started. "Dr. Jack Drake?" Surprise tinged his voice.

"As in the world famous Archaeologist," Raya replied stiffly.

Dick got the sense from the sudden shift in her tone and expression that there was something she wasn't sharing with them. Didn't take a scientist to figure out that that something had to do with the boy she was holding in her arms and his jet set parents. Bruce turned and stared down at the city buried beneath that thick mist. The steam still slunk through the streets, was split occasionally by a blast of water from one of the split water mains. Occasionally, a high-pitched shriek or low, keening wail shattered the silence of the night. Raya found she preferred the screams to the moans.

He climbed up onto the parapet. "Let's go, Robin."

Raya clutched his cape with frantic fingers. "Wait! There's nothing either of you can do for the infected people," she told them. "Until that mist burns off, it is hopeless and pointless. They are trapped in their fears. It's exactly what Crane hoped to achieve when he concocted this plan. A city literally trapped in its fear."

He gave a slow nod of his head. "And we might not be able to help the infected overcome their fears," he told her gently. "But we can at least prevent them from tearing the city and themselves apart in the process."

Raya got what he was saying. She understood. He needed to do whatever he could because he couldn't do what he wanted. It was a matter of helping who you could even while knowing that large majorities of people were still going to suffer. It was her Uncle Jim who'd told her that there was not always "a happy ending at the end of the night for a crime fighter." More often than not, their nights ended with regrets and recriminations, with deeply-seeded traumas and hurts that would never heal.

Before he jumped, Bruce leaned down and said in Raya's ear, "Go inside and call Alfred. Have him come and pick you up. Tell him to take you back to the penthouse."

"What about Tim?" she asked. She turned troubled eyes up to his. "I can't leave him here. Not after everything he's been through tonight."

Bruce ran his hand over the cap of her hair. "Alfred will figure out what to do for him, kiddo. Now go on. Get _him_ and _you_ inside the building. And," he added in a firm voice, "don't leave the building until Alfred comes for you, all right?"

"All right," she replied. She glanced over at Dick. "Bring him home safe, Robin."

_And you come home safe, too_, she told him silently.

"Okay, I'll bring Batman home safe." He gave her a playful grin. "But who's gonna bring _me_ home safe? Thinking I need my own sidekick here. Preferably one with green eyes and..."

"Go." She huffed. "Fight crime."

He jumped to the top of the parapet. "You're gonna miss me when I'm gone."

"You keep yapping and I'm gonna push you off that ledge."

"Nah," he told her in a sing-song voice. "Ya love me ta much ta do something like that ta me."

Then he stepped off into darkness. Raya merely rolled her eyes at his cheekiness before turning to head towards the roof access door. She looked down at the boy in her arms.

"Robin's really _not_ as cool as you think he is," she said to him. "He's kinda a dork actually."

The boy replied by giving her a heart-melting grin around the thumb he'd stuck in his mouth. "Uh-huh," was all he said. Raya just snorted a laugh and went inside to call Alfred.

* * *

Two menacing apparitions, one cloaked in blackest midnight and the other in red and neon green, burst into the midst of a group of escapees, knocking them down like bowling pins. Batman and Robin fought like demons, whirling in synchronized motion, always in constant step with the other because of how well each knew the other's movements. Arms were snapped, ankles were twisted, and bodies sent flying. One after another, the convicts hit the pavement. Silence again descended on the streets. Robin turned to see Batman standing over a fallen inmate. He could tell by the tick in the older man's jaw that it was taking everything he had to keep his vitriolic temper in check. Well, he could help with that.

"What? No more?" He shot a cheeky grin at the grim figure that was standing there, hands upon his hips. "And here I was just starting to have fun." One of the prisoners started crawling out of the alley. "Hey, looks like that one hasn't gotten the hint about staying face down on the concrete with his arms behind his back."

Batman booted the man in the head before turning to stalk towards Robin, his cape fluttering behind him like greedy, grasping fingers. The pointy ears of the cowl cast an ominous shadow upon the ground. Dick saw that those eyes blazed with emotions that he knew were akin to the same parental fear clawing away at James Gordon. Yet he also knew that part of the rage simmering within the older hero was out of his feelings of helplessness.

"What are we going to do now?" he asked him slowly. "We don't have enough of the fear antidote on hand to help the people that have been infected by Crane's toxin."

"We can't help the people who have been gassed at this point," Batman told the young superhero in a subdued voice. "But we can prevent them from being hurt by filth like this."

"So we're going to round up the convicts then?"

Batman shook his head. "I'll round up the convicts," he told him. "You get back to the penthouse and get changed. I have a feeling that we'll be having a guest staying with us for a few days."

Robin gave him lopsided grin. "Figured that out, too, huh?"

"It's her nature to protect those who are like her," Batman said quietly. "And she sees that Timothy Drake is just like her—a kid who has parents who are more interested in themselves than they are with raising their son."

Robin sighed. "Ya might wanna teach her that kids are not like puppies and kittens," he said with a smirk. "And to tell her that she can't adopt every kid that she just happens to rescue from a guy like Crane."

"She adopted you."

Robin scoffed. "She… Wait. Was that… _humor_?" Robin's mouth dropped open as he goggled. "Well," he said even as Bruce's lips curved with amusement. "Guess I owe Alfred twenty bucks. I told him you didn't possess a sense of humor."

Batman harrumphed. "And you now have double Robin homework for that bit of witticism."

Robin just groaned.

* * *

James Gordon stood next to his unmarked squad car a few hours after hell had been unleashed. The gutter that was nearest him was clogged with rushing water, as though the city had been hit by a massive storm. Yet the sky above him was crystal clear. The low hanging moon was big as a flying saucer as it slowly slid into the embrace of the horizon, the stars little diamonds that slowly winked before fading out. So the water was definitely coming from burst pipes, hundreds of pipes and water mains. Each and every one of them a conduit Crane had used to fill the city with a hallucinogenic mist that left hundreds of people in the grips of their own personal nightmares. What was left of the mist was slowly burning away with the encroaching dawn.

Gordon found that he had no reason to continue staring at the water, or to remain standing next to his car waiting for word that Crane had been spotted. He already knew the psychotic freak had managed to sneak away in the confusion. He, much like the dark knight, knew the Scarecrow would return just as soon as he had a new batch of that damned toxin ready. For now, he'd call it a night. He'd go home, make sure Barbara was okay and get a few hours of much needed rest. He told himself he didn't need to worry about his youngest girl. Raya was in the safest hands of them all.

He'd made sure of that.

* * *

During the short drive back to the penthouse, he used the phone in the Batmobile to call Lucius Fox and, in his Bruce Wayne voice, issued some instructions. Although it was now close to six in the morning, Fox sounded like he was fully awake, and when Bruce finished the call, Fox was already in the process of shipping out what antidote they had on hand to the hospitals that were overflowing with people who had been gassed by Crane.

Bruce parked the Batmobile in the bunker below Wayne Towers before he slowly made the transformation from exhausted vigilante to the just coming home from a date playboy he pretended to be. Alfred made tea, a cup of chamomile for each of them. Then he helped Bruce with removing the suit. Between the two of them, they got the suit off and put away in one of the spare cases the bunker had. Alfred took a moment to survey his employer's flesh for signs of fresh bruises, scrapes or burns. There were no outward signs of physical injury, which was unusual given the physical nature of Master Bruce's nocturnal career.

"Uneventful night?" he asked dryly.

"It was not as physically demanding a night as I usually have, no."

"Small miracles do happen."

Bruce moved his arms, legs, rolled his shoulders, stretching sore and stiff muscles. It had been a very long, very emotional draining night. "Where are the kids?" he asked as he crossed to the elevator.

"Asleep, sir," the older gentleman replied before pressing the button for the penthouse. "They fell asleep about thirty minutes before you arrived home."

"Was Gordon able to track down the housekeeper that Raya says normally takes care of the boy when the Drakes are away on business?"

Alfred nodded. "The housekeeper is currently recuperating at Gotham General." He looked over at Bruce, his expression grave. "She was given quite a knock on the head, and was unfortunately infected by the Scarecrow's poison."

"Were there any problems in getting permission for the boy to stay here with us for the next day or so while the housekeeper recuperates?"

"None, sir," Alfred replied. "Mr. King, in fact, seemed quite satisfied with having young Mister Drake stay with us while the police work upon contacting the boy's parents."

"Do they have any idea about where the Drakes are?"

"Miss Raya had her grandfather do some inquiring for her. Apparently," the butler indicated in a tone of voice Bruce recognized as the one Alfred used whenever he wanted to convey his displeasure. "Mr. and Mrs. Drake are on an archaeological dig in South America. They left word at the University that they would be out of contact for the next six weeks or so."

Bruce imagined that that particular piece of information had not gone over well with Raya. She'd become quite outspoken about domestic violence and parental neglect since her mother's death, and ferreted her time between school and training to various organizations and charities which sought to aide those who found themselves in abusive situations. His imp had become quite the crusader in the last few months, channeling her rage and grief into helping others who found themselves in situations similar to her own.

He'd supported her in that endeavor; encouraged it even. He'd also favored her decision to learn some basic fighting techniques. He'd understood that learning how to defend herself; protect herself was something she needed in order to overcome the abuse she'd suffered. It was another step in taking back what her father had stolen from her. Agreeing to train her had come with stipulations, the first being that she was not to go out on patrols. They'd worked out a reasonable compromise that suited her, Jim and himself quite nicely.

After the events of that night, though, he wondered if Raya would raise the subject of allowing her to finally go out on patrols. A part of him, the one which he knew was the vigilante, couldn't help but be proud of how she'd handled herself while in the face of serious danger. She'd remained cool and calm, thinking logically and doing what was necessary to keep the boy and herself safe while waiting for either him or Robin to arrive for the assist. However, a part of him hoped that she wouldn't bring the topic up. Putting her in the field with Crane as well as her father on the loose was not something he (or Jim Gordon) could allow.

He crept over to check upon the three figures stretched out upon the huge sectional situated in the middle of the living room. The penthouse may have been swamped in shadows, but he had no trouble navigating the sea of furniture in the pre-dawn light. He looked down at the trio who were lying there, fast asleep. Dick's arm was curved protectively around Raya, who was sleeping with her head cradled on his shoulder, her hand curled upon his chest. The little boy, Timothy, was snuggled between the back of the couch and Dick's other side, his head resting comfortably upon the older boy's chest, his thumb in his mouth.

Yet, it was the sight of both the teen's hands, resting protectively upon the boy's back, their fingers interlocked, that untied the strings which had kept his heart bound through the course of the hellish night. Emotions, raw and rabid, surged at the sight of that simple, warm and affectionate gesture. Even asleep, the two were a bonded pair and willfully pitting themselves against whatever enemy might try to harm the child who was currently under their care and protection.

"She's changed so much in nine months," he told Alfred in a hushed tone. "She's gained self-confidence and lost the haunted, hunted look she had when she first came to stay with us."

"Miss Raya is not the only one who has changed in these nine months," Alfred said gently. "You have changed as well, sir. And," he added after a moment's pause, "so has Master Richard."

Bruce cast a glance over his shoulder at the older man, a wry smile on his lips. "They've brought joy and light into my world, Alfred. The Manor does not seem the same lonely, sad place when they are there. And my life doesn't seem so empty now that they are part of it."

"I would say that their lives do not seem so empty now that they have _you_."

Bruce tucked a stray curl behind Raya's ear, skimmed his thumb over that silky cheek. "I don't know what I'd do if I lost them."

"I do not think that that is something you will ever have to worry about, Master Bruce."

"A father always worries about that, Alfred," Bruce said, and that ended the discussion.


End file.
